FATE GALACTIC MUSING

Here's an idea: using Fate Core to model out a RPG where you play Galactic Civilizations exploring the galaxy around them.

Its a simple concept, and it means that players spend a part of the game playing civilizations making big actions, ones that take years, decades or centuries to complete.  So, Scenes are going to be the smallest unit of measure of time here.  When Civilizations embark on something, the difficulty roll takes place, and a scene is played to reflect that.

Civilizations have skills: Aggression, Culture, Exploration, Faith, and Survival.  There are other skills too, but you need to have a stunt that enables or turns the skill on for you: Engineering, Industry, Warfare, Science, Art, Psionics, Covert Ops and Pacifism.

Aggression means the willingness to cause harm and start conflicts.  Handy if its the only means to handle crises and threats.   Also means it can trigger wars, as your people are used to using violence to handle their problems.

Culture means the willingness to create new ideas and spread them.  Handy for communicating ideas or trading information.  Bad, however, because your people tend to tell stories and talk when they should be doing other things.

Exploration means curiosity and the will to act on it.  Handy for finding new things or exploring new regions.  Bad because your people like to wander off, and might try to find something where they shouldn't be looking.

Faith means the ability to work together because you all believe in the same ideals and things.  Handy for keeping the civilization together.  Bad because it can keep your people from embracing new ideas and can drive them into attacking what might be a improvement for them.

Survival means using and understanding nature in order to stay alive.  Handy if your civilization needs to scrap by when resources are low or a trouble rains down on your people.  Bad in that it makes your people isolationist, and more prone to distrust outsiders.

Civilizations all get their own stress tracks, like so:
Population.  The numbers of your civilization.  There aren't any hard numbers here, but the less boxes you have, the fewer people are able to act to advance the civilization.  You can lose Population boxes and you can gain them too.

Military.  This is a add-on form of stress that is based on your rating in Aggression or Warfare.  You can spend Military stress to prevent the loss of Population stress.

Diplomacy.  Measures your civilization's resistance to diplomatic liasons and approaches.  To convince your civilization to agree to something it doesn't want to do, other civilizations or groups have to whittle you down in this.  All civilizations have a base Diplomacy of 2.  Some stunts can increase this.


This is the first rough idea I had of it.  More or less there are also stats for Planets and Stars.  Exploring or scouting sectors around you are turns in the game, following a sort of cosmic initiative of sorts.  Still hammering out the rough structure.

Scenes are roleplayed out after rolls are made, and players act out the scenes based on the results.  Aspects are things I'm also trying to figure out for it.

More to come on it when I think of it.  See ya.

There is a part two this here, if you want to read more on my musing.