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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7917433" data-attributes="member: 42582">I've never played Fate, and probably won't anytime soon, so my thoughts are a little bit conjectural.But to me it seems like choosing when to compel, as a Fate GM, is a bit like choosing how hard to narrate consequences in a game like Burning Wheel or Prince Valiant or 4e D&D, or choosing how hard a move to make in a game like Apocalypse World, or choosing when to activate a PC's limit in Marvel Heroic/Cortex+ Heroic. As a GM you have multiple obligations - to maintain pressure, to uphold the integrity of the fiction, to be fair to the players particular in respect of honouring their past successes. At least in my experience there is no magic formula which will combine all these duties and the current state of the fiction as input to produce a unique GM decision as output - so many intangible factors around table mood, pacing (the latter itself synergistic with the former), etc are in play I don't think there could be any such formula even in principle.I just posted an account of Prince Valiant play. In one session I initiated a social conflict which a player lost, with the result that his PC entered into a marriage somewhat against his own preferences. Later on, I used a GM fiat ability to have the same PC fall in love with a different NPC whom he was rescuing from her cruel husband (the Count of Toulouse). Looked at from the outside this might look more arbitrary than a compel: the player has chosen any sort of romance-related flaw for his PC, and there is no Fate point economy whereby he gains from going along with me, or can immediately pay me to leave his PC alone. He has to suck it up, at least until he earns a certificate (entirely in the gift of the GM, based on my sense of roleplaying intensity and entertainment) and so gets his own chance to use a fiat ability.Why the player accepts it - and I know this from talking to him - is because it's fun! It's hijinks in itself that leads to more hijinks. And it's hardly any sort of rabbit from a hat or bait-and-switch that in a relatively light-hearted Arthurian game knights should find themselves troubled by their relationships with damsels.EDIT: Just saw this relevant thing from Ovinomancer:To me that sounds a bit suck-y. It negates all the stuff I mentioned in this post as what I would assume would guide the use of compels.</blockquote>

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