I've been awarding my players chits in the Fortune Pool for good roleplaying. The problem is, they rarely use fortune, so there's constantly enough chits in the pool to do an 'unnecessary' fortune refresh.

How are others handling this? Do you put keep putting tokens in beyond the number necessary for a refresh? If there are more than enough, when do you allow players to refresh - anytime?

Also, the 'party tension' meter really doesn't seem to matter unless you're in combat rounds. In story mode they can just spend a few moments and scrub off any fatigue or stress.

It feels sort of like I'm forcing the mechanics on these things. I'm having trouble meshing them in.

How do you handle Fortune Pools and Party Tension?

I haven't run into the problem, but perhaps a good threshold would be 2x the party size? At that point, the "gods" stop favouring the players until they draw down their account. Maybe it's like equillibrium in some way...

As for the tension meter, I use it as a narrative tool. Until they deal with what is causing the stress/fatigue effects it doesn't clear up. So S/F gained during combat recovers per normal. S/F gained in story mode, lasts until they have some downtime, or until they extricate themselves from the situation causing the stress - whichever seems most appropriate for the scene.

Brainstorming here: maybe you can have a threshold set at the first stress mechanic effect. If party stress is equal or greater to that point, they receive limited S/F recovery individually - afterall, whatever is putting stress on the group hasn't been alleviated, therefore they are all likely to be wound up. If they get suitable downtime and or extricate themselves from the stressful environment/burdens, you can downgrade party stress. Once party is stress is below the first effect, the individual members recover S/F per normal. Until then, perhaps they just recover 1 stress per day, and 1 fatigue per hour. Or something...

For FP pool size, I think the limit is the party size. When it reaches that, they refresh. If a player can't take one because he is already at max, he can spend it on the spot. If not, the FP remains in the pool. This is by the rules. If the pool is full because everyone is already maxed, I would say there's no more FP awarded; however, as soon as one player spends a FP, they all get another shot at spending one. If no one else spends one at that time, then the pool will remain at 1 less than the party size and the very next FP earned would trigger another refresh. My players are Brash Young Fools and with only 3 players, they only need 2 FP awards before they all get one, so they don't worry about spending them. If your party's pool is remaining full all the time, clearly you need to give your players more incentive to spend FP. My players usually spend them on offsetting extra Misfortune dice I add to their roll. Maybe you need to crank up the penaties so that success without adding a Fortune die or two isn't as likely. If using the Basic Defensive actions for opponents and the ACE budget isn't enough, you may need to add more environmental or circumstantial Misfortune dice.

I agree that stress/fatigue taken in story mode doesn't bother the players too much unless you can spring an encounter on them so that they start out at a disadvantage and this isn't always possible or justified. Then again, I'm mostly bumping the tension meter during encounters since that is where the effects (or lack thereof) of party cohesion are most felt. I'm generally bumping it whenever the players take too long deciding on initiative order or can't agree on tactics. I also got an opportunity to bump it once during a combat when one player was heavily injured and another engaged him and used Guarded Position. Only problem was the injured player also had recharge counters on his Basic Melee attack action and the only other action card he had required that he not be engaged with any allies. It was great. "What are you doing?" "Trying to save your life." "That's great, now I can't attack!" Party tension meter time!