Post originally by David Goodner at 2003-07-09 07:52:12
Converted from Phorums BB System

That's more or less correct. You could easily play Everway with total GM Fiat, and even if you don't, it's going to be considerably more narrative-controlled than just about any other game.

Here's the way it works if you're primarily interested in Karma/Fortune resolution, though:

1 - Size up the challenge. For our example purposes, let's say a Knight is fighting an Ogre.

The Knight is Fire 4, Earth 3. The Ogre is Fire 5, Earth 6. The Knight is probably about to be tinned meat.

But, the Knight's skill with Fire is Swordsmanship, and he has armor and a Blessed Sword. Logically, the two are pretty evenly matched. (I'm just moving their stats by 1 point per advantage - the blessed sword counteracts a little of the Ogre's high Earth score)

2 - Play the card. For the moment, let's assume the card played is not the Knight's Virtue, Fault, or Fate.

There are lots of ways to interpret the cards, but guidelines in the book suggest (and I always used) the idea of applying the card to the PC involved. So if the Knight got "Drowning in Armor" it would be easy to figure out that he had a bit of a problem.

If he got "Death" (and we're assuming it's a bad card for now) he's probably in a world of hurt. But if he got Death Reversed, then maybe he just barely avoided death, or actually managed to kill off the ogre.

It's a little harder to figure out what to do if he got, say, The Satyr, but there are guidelines on the card. You'd read the guidelines and see how they might apply to the situation.

Still pretty heavy GM Fiat, but the GM is somewhat constrained by what's on the cards. If the Knight drew "Strength" (which might not even be one of the cards, but work with me here) then the meaning would be pretty clear. Strength is a positive card, and the positive value is applied to the Knight. In narrative terms, he gets a sudden burst of strength that allows him to best the Ogre.

David G.