There seems to be no limit to this card. That seems odd to me, as it makes stress/fatigue outside of combat pretty much pointless and makes it far less dibilitating in combat. I wanted to make sure this is correct, and if so if there is a fair way to limit this card (I thought about once per encounter or giving it a cool down, but I don't want to pick some limit that will cause my players to all go insane because it is too harsh).

Yeah, that card does make fatigue and stress pointless. That's why I allow it to be used only during combat.

Hi,

I dunno if this will work for your group but I've banned Assess from narrative time. Its fine in encounter mode but max of 1 stress/fatigue recovered per encounter. I'm fine with it being used as a breather with some progress tracker based activities too. eg: 3 chracters running from some orcs taking athletics checks to move 1 space along tracker against orc party token chasing them. The student is struggling to keep going as he has accumulated so many fatigue from these athletics tests but has a few spaces gap between himself and the orcs, so he sacrifices an athletics check to stay put for a turn and catch his breath - Assess the Situation...

I am fine with characters recovering stress/fatigue in narrative time, but they should want to do it narratively not flog the hell out of an action or talent! eg; "My character is ordering a large portion of roast pheasant and root vegetables, a flagon of ale, a hot bath and your best room sir. Getting fat, drunk, warm, clean and passing out on a soft bed" great lose all those little tokens and wake up with a slight hangover, and that pretty serving girl if your lucky...

Hope this helps

Have fun

I let player's use Asses the Situation during narrative time, but only once a day and it takes an entire "act" or "scene" ... meaning they are spending a long time considering what they are doing etc as if they where in a library or study.

Since cards recharge at this slower rate during narrative time I think they should take longer too.

I also only let them asses the situation once each during combat.

Technically, even with a card with recharge 0, you play it down in front of you, place 0 tokens on it, remove 0 tokens at the end of your turn, and pick it up at the end of your turn.

But if your turn is an hour long, you can only play it once an hour. If your turn is a day long, once a day.

It all depends on what's going on in story mode.

GravitysAngel said:

Exactly, thanks for explaining it better then I did ... (though my 1/day is an arbitrary house rule)

(Though that brings up what the discussion of what the difference between 0 and 1 recharge rate card is)

GullyFoyle said:

The difference is a 0 recharge card doesn't gain a toekn from using it. This is especially important if the card is played outside of your turn.

A recharge 1 card gets a token on it so so if played outside of your turn it won't be ready for the start of your turn.

Also if you say got a delay on a 1 recharge token it'd now have 3 tokens on it, leaving 2 at the end of your turn (after tokens are removed). A recharge 0 card on the other hand would gain 2 tokens on it so it'll recharge 1 turn faster.

I see stress and fatigue in two different categories.

Stress/fatigue you gain in an encounter are more temporary. It's like running out of breath or being really stressed because of adrenaline rush, etc.

Then, the stress/fatigue that you didn't healed at the end of the encounter (you automatically regain Will in stress and Tou in fatigue at the end of the encounter) are more persistent. It is like pain in your muscles after a hard physical activity or the mental weariness you get after a hard day's work.

So, I don't allow assess the situation to heal "long-term" stress/fatigue so basically, can't use it outside of encounters.

Silverwave said:

The healing of Toughness and Will to stress and fatigue at the end of an encounter, I assume that's a house rule or is that in there somewhere?

Rulebook p.62

At the end of an episode or encounter, characters immediately recover from some of their fatigue and stress. A character recovers from a number of fatigue tokens equal to his Toughness, and recovers from a number of stress tokens equal to his Willpower.

Silverwave said:

That is also the main reason Assess the situation isn't a problem outside of combat. Most of the time players won't have much (if any) stress/fatigue left after an encounter.

Yeah. Well, in a way, I feel like there's too much means to remove fatigue/stress while it doesn't harm that much being stressed/fatigued since it only adds black dices (50% of doing nothing).

My bigger issue was stress and fatigue outside of combat being absolutely pointless. There are several things in the game that give stress and fatigue in non-combat situations and it didn't seem to matter. I think I'll put some of the suggestions here to use. I was worried by limiting the card I might cause more insanities than I'd care fore and I want pc's to be able to "bleed off" stress and fatigue and not constantly accumulate it, I just don't want them to not have to worry about it or insanities at all.

Why is stress and fatigue outside of combat useless? If you are in story mode and something is happening to accumulate fatigue (say you're marching in full adventuring gear through open plains in summer and you get one fatigue per hour), eventually it will make a difference to someone in the party.

One of the new guides says that if your characters aren't constantly worried about stress and fatigue then your not giving out enough of either of them .

Its grim and perilious after all ...

EDIT: I can't find it in either guide, maybe it was a question answered in the Gen Con video of upcoming products? Does anybody else remember hearing/reading that fatigue/stress should be constant concern?

Silverwave said:

The iron breaker in my group has passed out from stress a few times and since he's often deep in reckless he often get a fatigue on each attack. He has all the cards available to remove stress and fatigue, but still it's something he keeps in mind.

I find the balance to be fine. Stress/fatigue should play a part in combat, but it shouldn't be dominating.

Why is stress and fatigue outside of combat useless? If you are in story mode and something is happening to accumulate fatigue (say you're marching in full adventuring gear through open plains in summer and you get one fatigue per hour), eventually it will make a difference to someone in the party.

The issues I'm referring to, all have to do with the topic of the thread...assess the situation. Didn't realize that was unclear. Stress and fatigue are useless outside of combat due to players being able to do that at will, hence the change is needed which is what this thread was about. The balance issues come in when changes are made to that card to ensure players aren't going to be constantly overwhelmed by stress and fatigue. That's why I was asking people who had made the changes already.

No changes need to be made to the card. Instead, changes need to be made to the GM's thinking and handling of the card.

Pretty much as has been said before, similar to healing, most action cards should be limited by the GM. The game leaves this up to the GM, since it is very dependent on what is occurring and what the players are doing. For example, if in story the PCs go to an inn and rest/sleep, then fatigue will recover faster than if the PCs spend the same amount of story-time working hard at a job.

In general, I allow a general action card to be used once per 'situation'. As an example, the PCs are at a party. I generally allow the PCs to use action cards once per NPC they talk to, as each NPC's conversation will typically be a 'situation' for them. So, they might have the chance to use a social card 4-5 times in an evening. However, since the group is busy and the PCs are 'working' at the party so aren't really able to relax, some action cards (like Assess) might only be able to be used once during the Act (ie the party).

WFRP3 is less rule dependent than some other games, and relies a lot on the GM making interpretations and decisions based on the situation and his group.

While I agree with your statement for the most part, I feel the need to defend the gm's (my) thinking, and don't like the notion that if it does not coincide with your thoughts it must be wrong. The point remains that none of this is discussed anywhere and thus those are house rules and will wildly vary from gm to gm. You can't expect everyone to reach the same conclusion you have. This should be made more implicitly clear on the cards or in the rules in general. Blame should not lie on the gm instead of the game because you differ in the way you run a game from the way I (or others) run a game. Regardless, bickering is not the point of this thread, and I will indulge you no further in the matter. I'm looking for honest help and productive responses to rules questions, hence the post in this forum. The question has already been answered to my satisfaction, which is that changes will have to be made to preserve balance.

I'm sorry if you took offense to my post. I was certainly not calling into question your capabilities as the GM at all, nor am I calling you 'wrong'. My post was intended to show an "easy" way to understand and utilize the mechanics that works. I have no problem if someone doesn't play or GM my way, as you suggest. I was trying to offer constructive advice, based upon my experience as a GM and what has worked for me. If it was interpreted otherwise, then I humbly apologize as that was not my intent. You can ask the others here that have been on the boards for a while, that I rarely (I try for never) cast stones at people or their abilities. I always try to provide helpful and intelligent information and advice to everyone that asks a question.

In my experience, the fact is that WFRP3 has placed much of the story and mechanics into the hands of the GM. It just does not have every minute detail explained to the GM. The game is about the story, with some mechanics, but the story and the needs will change quite a bit based on the circumstances and the player group. FFG cannot reasonably provide a list of specific situations during unstructured story time where mechanics like recharge apply consistently because situations vary so widely no list could every cover everything. So, it falls to the GM to handle it as they feel is appropriate for the group and the situation.

I'm saying this from my experience. You aren't 'wrong' or a bad GM if you haven't discovered this yet. I have found, however, by looking at the game with this mindset, I ,as the GM, have a bit more work to do, but the game seems to play and 'feel' better. As the GM, we are less fettered by dozens of rules and charts constraining what we can and cannot do. For example, the rules give some suggestions, but combat modifiers are ALL up to the GM depending on the current circumstances. Add misfortune for this or that, add fortune for something else, add an additional challenge because of X, and so on. It's fluid, and not based on charts or rules about "darkness always applies a penalty of X" or "Long range applies a penalty of Y". The GM has control to tell the story and modify as they go along. You'll see that sort of vibe and terminology throughout all the game rulebooks: The basics of the rules are there to help guide the GM, but much of the specifics are left up to the GM's decision.

So, from my experience and perspective, the same sort of concept gets applied to recharge during Story. I.e. it depends on the situation and the PCs. If they are doing strenuous activities during that portion, fewer fatigue/stress can be recovered. If they are relaxing somewhere, more fatigue and stress can be recovered. It's a point of view that has worked well for me, and seems (at least to me) to fit in perfectly with how the rules were written. I just wanted to suggest that if you would take a few moments to think about the game with this in mind, you might resolve some of your difficulties and questions. Take what you want from it, whatever might be helpful to you. Discard anything that isn't. I just want to help you and your group to have fun playing the game, however it ends up working.