I had a thought, and then a BETTER thought, all of which ends up making no difference at all.
What if the GM could pay stress (returning it to characters) in exchange for adding flashbacks that were maybe not helpful to them? So like they bump into someone that they know who they wronged, or owe something, or who likes them and it isn’t mutual, etc. Or they were going to fix something and they didn’t. That sort of reverse-planning thing.
Then I realized that works EVEN BETTER if you consciously think of reverse flashbacks that are unhelpful as a way to make complications when the dice call for them.
In other words, when a player rolls a complication, one way to look at the ways a GM can respond is that the GM can put in a flashback that’s just now turning out to be unhelpful, just as players put in flashbacks that are helpful.
So you look at the sort of things players can do with flashbacks, and turn them inside out as complications. “Sure, you were going to bring your long gun, but didn’t Harvey borrow it? He did. Damn.”
This ends up having no impact on the rules as written, but it’s a fun mental exercise for the GM to have more creative complications.
I like this a lot Andrew. I’d caution a GM using this technique to make sure it still follows from the fiction (i.e. the flashback makes sense as a preparation your target would make or as something that your scoundrels might have done to jeopardize themselves).
Also, consider if such a consequence can be resisted. “Yeah, Harvey wanted to borrow the gun, but I told him to make sure he got it back to me by now” is doable. However “The Hive member prepared for your ambush and has an ambush of her own ready” may be harder to justify resisting.
Ooooh, this is interesting! Plus’d.
Sean Nittner “Can be resisted” is an interesting idea. I’ll have to re-read the complications before I venture forth an opinion on that; see how all that sifted out to the final version.
You could just do bad flashbacks as a devil’s bargain too!
I once put WAAAY too much thought into devil’s bargains. =)
https://fictivefantasies.wordpress.com/2016/10/01/devils-bargain/
Yeah, I mean normally all consequences can be resisted but I’ve been in some situations where we really have to ponder at “how” and if there isn’t a way to in the fiction, then I don’t think it can be done.
Example, in the last Bloodletters game, Arcy used Not To be Trifled with to perform a near superhuman feat of strength to jump off the top of the Crows Tower as it was collapsing, all to justify the ability to resist the Fatal Harm she and Canter were going to take. Because without some kind of miraculous justification, bombing a 12 story building you’re at the top of means grabbing a ghost playbook.
Any who, it may not matter to much in a game, but if the consequence is entirely in the purview of the NPCs I’d have hard time justifying the way a PC could resist.
Sean Nittner That’s part of what I need to look at before I come down solidly on an opinion. Does the Resist grant the PLAYER some mitigating narrative control, or the CHARACTER some mitigating action?
When I’ve played in the past I narrowed Resist rolls to only affecting damage to the characters, and that way it was clear and straightforward that stress came from bolstering toughness or reflexes or charm to avoid taking damage. Now I’m trying to retrain myself to go RAW and I’ll have to read over it again to see how it’s supposed to work.
I’ve kind of imagined it as working like that already anyways. I’m sure I’ve seen something like that happen anyways. I like that it seems in keeping with how stress and consequences are very closely related to aspects, stress, and consequences in Fate games.
Okay, I’ve read p. 32-33 about Resistance and thought about it, and I am greatly pleased that the GM is the one who sets the outcome of resisting.
The player can still choose whether to try and resist or not, and if the attempt is made it is automatically successful, so the player still has some power here.
But the rules are explicit that adjusting how consequences are reduced or avoided, the GM establishes the overall tone of the game.
That makes me happy.
So for the gun example, a character is pursuing a target who is escaping, and wants to position to shoot at him, and rolls a complication. The GM says the complication is “you forgot your ammo pouch! Or did you? Do you want to resist that?” And the player knows the choice clearly; stress and you’ve got it, or no stress and you don’t.
I could also see phrasing it as “You see the servant’s profile, and your blood freezes–is that Isilde? Or is it someone else, a trick of the light?” And there’s some eyebrow waggling and the player can choose to resist.
Those could pitch choices at the player, not the character, but I don’t think that’s out of bounds for what can be done for a resistible consequence if that’s how the GM is comfortable playing and the stakes are clear.