Fate Condensed · 2020 CC-BY SRD
Ways to Handle Multiple Targets
Optional Rules > Ways to Handle Multiple Targets
Inevitably, someone at your table will want to affect multiple targets at once. If it’s allowed, here are some methods you can use.
If you wish to be selective about your targets, you may split your effort. Roll your skill, and if the resulting total is positive, you can split that total up however you like among the targets, who each get to defend against the effort you assigned to them. You must assign at least one point of effort to a target, or you didn’t target them at all.
Sophie faces a trio of goons and wants to strike at all three in a flurry of thrusts with her rapier. Thanks to an invoke and a good roll, her Fight roll comes in at Epic (+7). She assigns a Good (+3) attack to the one that looks the most veteran, and Fair (+2) to each of the other two, for a total of seven. They each then roll to defend.
In some special circumstances, as with an explosion or similar, you may make a zone attack against everyone in one zone, friend and foe alike. Here, you don’t split your effort; every target must defend against your total roll. The circumstances and method must be right for doing this; often the GM will require you to invoke an aspect or use a stunt to gain permission.
If you wish to create an advantage affecting a whole zone or group, target the scene instead: place a single aspect on the zone or the scene itself rather than placing separate aspects on each of the targets. This has the added advantage of reducing overall book-keeping. If someone insists on creating a separate aspect on each target, they should be constrained to the effort splitting method.
With any of these methods, all of the targets should occupy the same zone. The GM may allow the occasional exception due to method and circumstance.
Only one action type should be used—such as attacking several targets in one blow, solving two problems at once with overcome, or swaying the minds of a few key NPCs with create an advantage. A GM might allow two different action types under special circumstances, but those actions should make sense for the skill used by both.