Fate of Falkenstein: Gadgets

More on hacking Fate Core (Evil Hat Productions) to play Castle Falkenstein (R. Talsorian Games): Victorian gadgets!

Castle Falkenstein pp. 190-191 and 208-215 covered engines of war, gadgets, anachrotech, inventions, mad science, Engine Magick, and vehicles. In addition, the supplements Steam Age and The Lost Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci expanded considerably on this. These rules are actually quite simple and can be used without much change; however, they are not very “realistic.” Do we care? That depends on the group.

Simple Gadgets

If you want simple plug-and-play gadgets that have limited use in the story and are just the means to an end, you can get them off the rack, or just about, by using the rules from Castle Falkenstein p. 209: pick a common gadget container from the left-hand column, and pick one or more off-the-rack gadgets from the right-hand column to fill the available spaces; pay the required price.

If you want to be fancy about it—usually when a player character is making the gadget—have the maker test Tinkering to overcome a Fair [+2] difficulty; rushing the work raises the difficulty to Good [+1]. Succeeding at a cost means the gadget will have a special flaw. Succeeding with style means the gadget will have the aspect Fine Workmanship.