High Fantasy Magic - FAQ

If you haven't heard, I released a supplement for Fate Core last year called High Fantasy Magic. It is a simple magic system that aims to add as little as possible, while still allowing the PCs to improve upon their magical abilities. Here's a quick list of Frequently Asked Questions for anyone interested in the supplement.

Why did you write High Fantasy Magic?

One of the more common topics to come up both on the Fate subreddit and Google+ Community is magic. Many people new to the system don't realize how versatile Fate is, and try to tack on tons of rules as a result. I did this too. After learning and playing Fate for a year or so, I thought it would be helpful to have a supplement that basically tells you how to use Fate as is for a magical setting.

I also enjoy Fantasy myself, and wanted to be able to tell the same kind of stories told with games like Dungeons & Dragons. I believe High Fantasy Magic does this fairly well, while not sacrificing the focus on story that Fate encourages. There isn't a lot of material out there for Fantasy in Fate either, so my goal was to help fill that hole.

How can I make my own magic disciplines?

There is no exact formula for this, but basically, you want something broad and without a cap. Remember that you can always rename a discipline too.

For example, I had a player who wanted to create a new discipline called Void. When asked, he told me that he wanted to be able to teleport by opening portals into the void and stepping through them. Yes, this has it's own flavor added to it, but it is basically the same as the Teleport discipline, so no need to reinvent the wheel. Just take Teleport and your aspect should tell you how it can look in the narrative.

Another player wanted to affect time. This is a pretty cool concept. At it's most powerful, time travel would technically be possible. At it's lowest, you might be able to slightly slow or speed up a target, or get a glimpse of what they're about to do. These are all pretty simple Create an Advantage rolls, so we wrote a couple of examples down for reference and started playing.

What's the difference between this and Aspect Based Narration?

High Fantasy Magic was inspired by Aspect Based Narration, so the two are very similar. However, Aspect Based Narration doesn't really have a built in limit of how broad your permitting aspect is other than letting your group decide. For experienced groups, this may work fine, but as a newcomer to Fate it can be hard to figure out how much ability is too much and how to balance those abilities in a group. This magic system allows you to grab it start playing.

Do you plan to do anything else in the fantasy genre?

Okay, no one asked me this question, but I wanted to throw it in anyway. Since our hobby is so saturated with fantasy, and Fate doesn't really have much in the fantasy department, I am working on an epic fantasy setting called The Daegal Legends.

Land is running out as war brews when a mysterious land appears in the middle of the ocean. Explorers flock to the continent called Daegal seeking salvation, but find dangers as treacherous as those they left behind.

If you like this idea and want to hear more about it, subscribe to this blog or follow me on social media. Links can be found on the About page.

Do you have any other questions about High Fantasy Magic? Ask them below in the comments.

UPDATE (12/5/2019) High Fantasy Magic is now also available on Amazon in Print and eBook.

Unless stated otherwise, the text of the above blog post is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International license.

The High Fantasy Magic book cover is by Nick Kienzle.

Tags: fantasy fate core high fantasy magic the daegal legends ttrpg writing