Fate Core: Magi pt 7

Randy Scott Slavin

Oh, The grand old Duke of York,
He had ten thousand men;
He marched them up to the top of the hill,
And he marched them down again.
And when they were up, they were up,
And when they were down, they were down,
And when they were only half-way up,
They were neither up nor down
                                   ~Nursery Rhyme

Stress
when I put my thoughts on stress down, I had not really had a lot of time to think them over yet. After considering my initial position I have decided to change the Stress tracks to something that fits my game a bit more. There was nothing all that wrong with my initial ideas on Stress. The issue came when I was working on the rest of the world. Having a mind stress track was just too rigid, especially because there are some factions and people who seek to eradicate the concept of mind. So I had to change it up, and after rereading Mage: the Ascension, I think I figured it out.

I had wanted something that worked a lot like the paradox mechanics in Mage. I got very close with my thoughts on how nodes work. When you use magic in a node that has a style different from those supported by that node, it rolls against you. It becomes a conflict. It defends and attacks. Originally I was going to have it inflict Will stress, but that is not really correct in the world of the game. It is not your will that protects you, it is your ability to change the world around you. I know that can get a bt semantic, but I think there is a key difference there. I have now decided to have two kinds of stress, pattern and discord.

Pattern stress represents your selfhood, and your resistance to changes by outside forces. When someone tries to change you this is the type of stress they have to create. If you get stress out in this manner, you are taken out, and the person who took you out will have free reign on your pattern. Pattern consequences will be large or small changes to yourself. Either physically or mentally.

Discord stress represents how in tune you are with the world immediately surrounding you. You take stress only when you are casting magic in an area not conducive to that type of magic. The world fights back. When you get taken out it is bad, very bad. It changes your style aspect to match its own. Discord consequences are representative of how out of tune you are with the surrounding world. So on the low level, it could be a bit of bad luck, at the higher levels it could be full blown hallucinations, or you are cursed with stigma or a 'witches mark' of some kind.

Person of interest
The Once and Future King: He has slept in a sealed node for time immemorial. all that is left of his glorious shining kingdom are few half remembered stories. His rest is watched over by his three closest companions. He awaits the sounding of teh horn and the call to once again take up the sword and the banner. To call to all men, good and true. To face the evils of the world and drive them back to the shadows whence they came. He was the king, is the king, and shall be so again. Until that day he sleeps. He dreams. Oh, such dreams as would make the angels weep.

Belief: Good will triumph over evil
Style: By my Sword and my deeds
Love: The weak need protecting
Failing: Too Trusting