Now that we have
Survival detailed [...] we don’t have to stop there. lets look at
passive discovery and
automatic discovery.
Passive Discovery
Where the GM might call for a Notice
roll to see if the characters process something they’ve just seen or heard
in an actionable fashion—should be split into all the other skills. Investigate is the default, but every skill can be used to discover something: Lore
to process that some arcane writings are actually a passcode to magically
open a door, Shoot to get a sense of what weapon was just shot from a distance (“That’s a very distinctive sound” from "Leverage’s" Eliot), Empathy
to reflexively tell if someone’s lying, etc. Tis means that anything where
the character isn’t intently focusing on something, just the brain automatically processing stimuli in a useful way, is covered by how well versed the character is in a feld. (Tis will naturally include ways where Survival conveys such information, such as spotting a useful item in the muck or seeing
a hidden danger.)
Automatic Discovery
This concept centers around rewarding characters with high competence in any feld (which is every character in a Fate game) by ensuring
they never miss key information. In automatic discovery, all of your skills
rated at Good [+3] and higher have an additional beneft: they always succeed at
overcome actions or creating advantages that involve passive discovery—i.e.,
any time when the GM would normally call for a skill roll to spot or hear
something that is reflexive and takes no time or effort. No roll is required;
the characters are just that good. Now instead of the person with a high
Notice being the person who discovers all things, the person with the high
Athletics notices the martial arts an opponent is using (thus suggesting
where they trained), the high Burglary sees the telltale scratches around a
lock or window pane that suggests it’s been compromised, and so on.
The characters can still make actions involving active discovery, just as
normal. Nothing’s changing in that regard for creating advantages or other
actions that involve focused effort. After all, Notice isn’t really useful in that
regard; that’s where Investigate (or other skills, depending on the situation)
comes into play.
Furthermore, we’ll add a little bit more to skills that are Great [+4] or
higher—assume they succeed with style at passive discovery. That means
extra free invocations or other benefts from being one of the setting’s top
experts or masters of that feld or discipline.
In settings where gaining knowledge is potentially harmful, such as
those where fghting to retain one’s sanity is a big deal, automatically succeeding at passive discovery is one of the most dangerous things to have. And
that makes it even more interesting. But even without that, this dynamic
highlights every character’s mind and ability to discover and unconsciously
process things under fire.
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