I've decided I don't like the way Jaded functions. The RT version seems decidedly superior to the DH version as it provides not only immunity to Insanity Points caused by 'outrageous events', but also to Fear Tests from the same. An immunity to Fear Tests from xenos, pirates, and pretty much anything that's not a 'Terror of the Warp' eliminates what I consider an important aspect of the game. As written, Jaded characters are OK in the presence of a Genestealer, a Lictor, or even a full-on Tyranid invasion!

It also causes some problems when the Jaded character doesn't know whether or not something is a 'Terror of the Warp' in-game (Slaught don't scare him - as long as he thinks it's not a daemon, and he might be OK with daemons if he thinks they are xenos). I'd rather make something that is a little less powerful in some ways, but avoids crossing into metagaming at all. Here's my house rule for Jaded:

Jaded: When you take a Fear Test, the Severity of Fear is reduced by one level. If the Severity of Fear is reduced below Fear (1) Disturbing, you automatically succeed on the Fear Test. Otherwise, you take the Fear Test against the reduced Severity of Fear.

I've also made a house rule to address the odd wording of Survivor (Death World feature). Here's what I've done:

Survivor: You gain a +10 to Willpower Tests to resist the effects of Fear and Pinning.

HappyDaze said:

Uhm, the DH version kinda worked like that as well.

I wouldn't nerf the Jaded talent however, it works fine the way it is. But it could induce some justifiable Fellowship penalties though, since most Jaded characters tend to be a little psychopathic to say the least. I mean, the "warmness" of your personality will probably suffer if you're actually able to slice open little infants in their cribs with a knife without as much as making a face (which Jaded characters, as per the rules as written, are perfectly able to do if they had to/wanted to). Another thing you could do is making Jaded characters roll against Willpower anyway, but each time it isn't a warp induced source, the Jaded character just recieves a few more insanity points instead of breaking down and pissing his pants, making the Jaded talent a sort of double edged sword. Yes they might be able to keep their wits about them even in truly panicked and scary situations, but the more of the horrors and atrocities they witness and shut down emotionally, the more they are dragged into the realms of insanity.

Your version retains the RT immunity to Fear Tests while dropping the 'no IPs' portion from the original DH version. That's not the direction I want to go at all, and I obviously disagree that the Rt version (and even the DH version) work 'fine the way they are' written. This is a house rule thread, so obviously posts that are little more than 'don't do it' are just threadcrapping.

It also causes some problems when the Jaded character doesn't know whether or not something is a 'Terror of the Warp' in-game (Slaught don't scare him - as long as he thinks it's not a daemon, and he might be OK with daemons if he thinks they are xenos). I'd rather make something that is a little less powerful in some ways, but avoids crossing into metagaming at all. Here's my house rule for Jaded:

Oh, there's a pretty simple answer to that problem: The Jaded character knows something is a "Terror of the Warp" when he has to take a Fear test against it. The limitation of the talent is not about finding warpy stuff inherently more spooky than mundane dangers (as you correctly surmised, a full-scale Tyranid invasion is somewhat more scary than a lone chaos fury in the sights of your multilaser), but about said warpy stuff working its way into your brain and finding that 'you're soo doomed! ' trigger and handing you a healthy dose of Corruption while it's there.

Your version retains the RT immunity to Fear Tests while dropping the 'no IPs' portion from the original DH version. That's not the direction I want to go at all, and I obviously disagree that the Rt version (and even the DH version) work 'fine the way they are' written. This is a house rule thread, so obviously posts that are little more than 'don't do it' are just threadcrapping.

I disagree. "Don't do it" can be valuable advice. Further, Varnias' post had half a line of "don't do it" and six lines of alternative ideas - sorry if you don't like them...

Other than that, I liked DH's Jaded best, since that system had a relatively well-customizable degree of psychic stability - between Jaded, Frenzy, Fearless, Unshakeable Faith, Resistance Fear/Pinning and that roll-pinning-twice thingy, most characters should be well-represented.

Cipher, you're suggesting playing Jaded under the DH version of the Talent (i.e., Jaded just prevents suffering IPs from failed Fear Tests against any source that is not a "Terror of the Warp", but does nothing to block the other effects of Fear), right?

I may do that - it still makes the Talent plenty useful, and I strongly prefer it over the suggestion in Post #2 that was essentially the opposite (immunity to all non-"Terror of the Warp"-caused Fear effects except the IPs).

Right now, what I dislike is that Jaded is entirely superior to Resistance (Fear) except when encountering a "Terror of the Warp' (which, IMO, should be rather uncommon in a RT game compared to most DH games). The RT reading of Jaded just seems to block out too much (like the mind-ripping terror of a full-on Tyranid invasion) too easily since it seems like a clear choice right from the beginning for Death World characters. I also don't like that it's a form of 'detector' for pinging a "Terror of the Warp' - when the Jaded character has to make a Fear Test, you know it's a daemon (or similar), but that's still there with the DH version too.

Cipher, you're suggesting playing Jaded under the DH version of the Talent (i.e., Jaded just prevents suffering IPs from failed Fear Tests against any source that is not a "Terror of the Warp", but does nothing to block the other effects of Fear), right?

More or less, yes. I'd have to look up who gets it when and for what price to say for sure - after all, the Rite of Pure Thought is also strictly better than Fearless.

Oh, and the nick is Cifer, not Cipher.

Edit: I just looked it up and the placing seems to still come from the DH talent (if the GM doesn't throw warp stuff at you every second adventure) - Jaded is granted to Navigators at rank 2 for 200 while they get Fearless at rank 6 for 500. So yeah, back to DH it is.

Or, of course, you could further delineate, making Jaded characters immune to Insanity points from non-warp sources and Fear tests from gruesome sights like the scene of a murder, but not actual threats like the aforementioned Tyranid invasion.

Sorry about the Cipher/Cifer thing. This **** forum isn't so good for checking such things, and it's a ***** to edit anything.

Now that we've thrown the actual readings of Jaded around, what do you think about my house rule in Post #1. I think that reducting the Severity of Fear (Fear Rating) is an easy fix and it provides effective immunity against Fear 1 right from the start. It also works with the rules allowing you to ignore greaer levels of fear as your IP go up. For example, at 20 IP normally allow a character to ignore Fear 1, with my version of Jaded, a character with 20 IP could effectively ignore Fear 2.

By removing the absolute protection against IP from sources that are not TotW, you also eliminate problem points like a Death World character with Jaded that has IP but no CP - by the rules, such a character could only have gained IP from sources that would also inflict CP.

HappyDaze said:

I didn't say "don't do it", I said that I didn't see much reason for doing it. If you're gonna make a houserule it should be able to stand up to some scrutiny without coming off as completely arbitrary, right?

I've provided explanations for why it's not completely arbitrary.

1) So a character can have IP without CP.

2) So a character can't auto-pass the check to avoid being terrified of a Tyranid invasion with a starting Talent.

3) So the Talent doesn't function as a TotW detector.

I always took the DH one to be that of a 'jaded real life cop'; i.e. someone who has seen the worst of human scum (****, murder, ritual mass suicide, grizzly mutilation etc). But then Xenos would constitute 'supernatural'. In a sense the difference between getting insanity from investigating a CSI case or an X File.

With RT I understand it brings xenos and others into the fold and then species 'terrors of the warp' I'd say that's a poor move.

Rather, they should've specified 'mundane xenos'. As per the book a RT Jaded character would be utterly fine with a C'tan bouncing around but could still develop trouble because of a psyker accidentally bending a wall.

I'd rebalance it to put it that 'Jaded RT' should simply expand the 'mundane' side. DH mundane is 'CSI' mundane. RT is 'X Files' mundane. The X Files never dealt with Cthulhu, or the Void Dragon, or the Tyranid Hive Fleet. Hell, they didn't even deal with ID-4/Independence Day style invasions. Or even Mars Attacks.

Thus Jaded. (I'd discuss it with the players too, but explaining it in terms of CSI->X Files->40k.)

To make a 'correction' to the wording, however, I'd find it a bit difficult to summarise what I said above concisely. Oops.

(EDIT: Don't be specific in terms of Terrors of the Warp, instead be specific in what counts as 'Rogue Trader Mundane': Orks, mention of an Umbra or Hrud, grizzly deaths, the odd unsettling reaction to warp drive [very minor daemonic incursion?])

Xisor said:

Couldn't tht be done as downgrading the severity of these by one level as I suggested. That way things that are merely 'Disturbing' off your radar and everything else is a little easier to deal with too.

My other possible change to Jaded would be to give it the Insanity Point equivalent-effect to Armour of Contempt. IOW, it's only effect would be to reduce any IP inflicted on the character - from any source - by 1 (to a minimum of 0). It wouldn't directly touch Fear Tests at all, and it now compliments all other Talents without overriding them.

HappyDaze said:

A nice, stream-lined way of handling it. I approve.

Jaded 1.0 is fine as it is in DH. I find it a good tool for building and defining characters, which helps the story. I'd like to see a Jaded 2.0 that lets you avoid insanity points at supernatural, warpy and xenos effects, as long as they are not too severe. This would represent you having turned callous and experienced in matters outside of human possibilities. "What do we have here then? Oh, another daemonposessed xeno bioconstruct that goes berserk and paints the walls with magical runes using nothing but human infant intestines harvested from the nearby orphanage. Dammit, these things always happens a quarter to four on friday afternoon." So taking this view as true, I think HappyDaze's suggestion about lowering all fear ratings by one is very good.

There is however the conflicting view that the wap is something that actually _does_ something to you, apart from the experience of anything really strange challenging your perception of how the world works. If the warp truly has such a "supernatural ability" (I'm sorry about the fuzzy concept) to affect you beyond the realms of regular psychology, it could be more powerful. I mean that a wall filled with _true_ runes of chaos painted in blood would destroy your mind much more than a wall filled with _made_up_ runes painted in blood. If this sentiment is true for your 40k interpretation, then Jaded should not help against "true chaos" phenomena.

Mellon said:

Jaded 1.0 is fine as it is in DH. I find it a good tool for building and defining characters, which helps the story. I'd like to see Jaded 2.0 that lets you avoid insanity points at supernatural, warpy and xenos effects as long as they are not too severe. This would represent you having turned callous and experienced in matters outside of human possibilities.

That would either be the Rite of Pure Thought-talent (available to Techpriests only), or perhaps the "From Beyond" trait. But both implies that you have pretty much been driven so insane/inhuman that nothing can really affect you mentally anymore.

I'd say that this is deliberate in a Call of Cthulhu-esque way, that humans aren't meant to know or "get used to" certain supernatural things, and the only way for them to be that way would be to either relinquish their sanity or their humanity.

'tis the grimdark thing to do.

So taking this view as true, I think HappyDaze's suggestion about lowering all fear ratings by one is very good.

Thank you for you support.

My only suggestion for a solution to making Jaded not an immediate 'Detect Demon' ability is to simply RP the WP test out. Don't simply say "Make a fear check". Say something like, "You feel your stomach tighten and your throat constrict as a strange dizziness grips you. Make a WP check." Then the player isn't quite sure what is going on. They don't know if they're being attacked or what. Even if they have skills or abilities that give them immunities or bonuses to the roll. If they ask then say, "I've taken that into account... Make your roll."

Keep 'em on their toes.

Everything else seems peachy.