To me, a gritty setting is one in which the characters are capable, but even skilled characters can get unlucky and suffer extreme consequences. This has been my experience with low-level characters in D&D and especially in the Warhammer (both Fantasy and 40K) percentile systems (especially when the GM thinks of unmodified roles as “easy” ones instead of following the rules guidelines that “easy” rolls should give bonuses–this is easy to forget in the thick of the game). To me, having low-powered characters with correspondingly-low chances of success is not gritty it’s either frustrating or comical. I’m of the mind that this is a false dichotomy.

They give players Fate or Plot Points to shift the narrative in their favor from time to time. Second, I like my settings gritty.Īt first, these things may seem contradictory both Fate and Cortex involve capable characters from the get-go with fairly high chances of success in their actions.

First, I prefer narratively-structured games, like Fate and Cortex Plus/Prime.

Readers who’ve followed the blog for some time have likely picked up two things with regards to my favored approaches to roleplaying games.

Cortex prime game handbook