Fantasy Craft Second Printing Q&A Thread

[Crafty_Pat]

Question about Explosive Damage.  Is the Reflex DC equal to the base damage rolled, or the actual damage the character would be subject to, after damage fall off and DR and whatever else?

Base damage rolled.

[tfwfh]

Thanks for the quick turn around, now I have a question about tricks.  Can an attack trick be applied to any attack action, or just to a standard attack?  For instance, Taunt is an attack action.  Could a character that is using Taunt apply Cheap Shot, which is an attack trick?

I can imagine ways this might be accomplished.  For example, splashing mud in someone's face would probably be an effective taunt and hurt their charisma based checks.  Or kicking them in the shin would grab their attention and affect their speed.  Of course, other combinations of action and trick are harder to describe.  For instance Taunt + Called Shot is hard to visualize, but then it also doesn't really accomplish anything so it doesn't seem like it would come up.

And for that matter could a hypothetical movement trick (I don't know of any) be applied when the character takes a Reposition action, or Total Defense?

I ask because I'm considering a movement trick for the mass effect conversion v2 and considering it from that light, I realized I don't entirely understand how that would work.

[Sletchman]

It all looks legit to me.  Attack tricks on attack actions is totally fair game (and your examples don't have any melee attack tricks on attack actions - which would be breaking the rules).

I could think of a few movement tricks (especially once magic - space or regular - comes into play), so I think it's just that there isn't any yet, rather then at all.  As long as you're writing them as "Movement tricks" it'll be ok - unless you want to make them specifically a reposition trick, or a total defence trick (the later of which there's a couple of).

The above is totally opinion though, so I'd be curious to see Pat / Alex chime in with original rule intent.

[Crafty_Pat]

When we design attack tricks, we're generally thinking of actions that involve or require an attack check. Likewise, movement tricks - if ever we were to create any - would probably be focused on actions that involve or require actual movement.

Now, this isn't to say that your combos there aren't interesting, or that you shouldn't make a case for them at the table. Like much of the Fantasy Craft system, the action rules are quite forgiving of interpretation - purposefully so - and we encourage unexpected and innovative applications in play.

[Morgenstern]

The Charging Basics feat offers a move trick.

[Gentry]

Situation: An NPC with baseline Cha 10 and the Devoted quality can cast a spell. This is cast as a Divine spell, following the rules as written.

Question: Whats the save DC? 10?

[Crafty_Alex]

Situation: An NPC with baseline Cha 10 and the Devoted quality can cast a spell. This is cast as a Divine spell, following the rules as written.

Question: Whats the save DC? 10?

DC 10, yes.

[Gentry]

Is there an NPC quality that increases save DCs for spellcasting? Or must they be assigned Spellcasting Feats in order to derive that benefit?

[aegis]

That or higher Charisma!

[Bill Whitmore]

Is there an NPC quality that increases save DCs for spellcasting? Or must they be assigned Spellcasting Feats in order to derive that benefit?

As written, I don't believe there is a quality for that.  I tend to use +2 to save DCs costs 3XP.  If I was to formalize that, it would look like:

Spell Power (+3 XP per grade): The Save DC of spells cast by the NPC increases by 2.

Both Charisma and Feats allow NPCs to increase spell DCs on a 1 for 2 XP basis, so I wanted the value to be less than that.  But +1 DC for 1 XP seemed too cheap, so I split the difference.

[cjs65]

Massive damage question: Does it apply to damage inflicted by spells? The wording says 'damage in a single hit'. Is a spell effect a 'hit'?

Situation: A CL 14 Mage casts Disintegrate with the Power Spell trick at a Level 13 Soldier PC. The PC easily makes his Fort save for half damage, so 'only' takes 70 of the potential 140. Less DR this is 59 damage. Applying the massive damage rule, he now has to make a DC 29 Fort save or die. Is this correct?

[Crafty_Pat]

Massive damage question: Does it apply to damage inflicted by spells? The wording says 'damage in a single hit'. Is a spell effect a 'hit'?

That's a great question (and one I haven't seen before).

I would rule that massive damage only kicks in with attack spells, which can hit. Other spells don't attack, so they can't hit.

Attack spells are identified by the word "attack" in the Distance line.

[Bill Whitmore]

Massive damage question: Does it apply to damage inflicted by spells? The wording says 'damage in a single hit'. Is a spell effect a 'hit'?

That's a great question (and one I haven't seen before).

I would rule that massive damage only kicks in with attack spells, which can hit. Other spells don't attack, so they can't hit.

Attack spells are identified by the word "attack" in the Distance line.

This is the same rule of thumb I have used to determine whether or not DR effects damage from spells since DR says it reduces damage from any hits.

[Crafty_Pat]

This is the same rule of thumb I have used to determine whether or not DR effects damage from spells since DR says it reduces damage from any hits.

This is a good rule of thumb. I approve.

[aegis]

Same here. I encountered the issue with a 14th level Mage who dealt massive fire damage. But my concern was twofold. First, massive damage, which I've ruled just about similarly. And second, catching fire! When you suffer from more than 50 damage in one hit, it's quite hard to succede with your Reflex save...