I started to think about the Fear rules today after being called upon to make a fear check in a game. I was wondering about immunity to fear and looked up the rule Only the Insane Shall Prosper which reads 'If the first digit of a character's Insanity total is double or more a thing's fear rating the character is unaffected by it and does not need to make a fear check'.

By RAW this means if a character has an Insanity total of 8 or 9 then he is immune to Fear Rating 1,2,3 and 4.

I understand that this is obviously not the intent of the rule which is meant to say 'if the tens digit is double or more a thing's fear rating the character is unaffected by it and does not need to make a fear check' but I do find it amusing that there is a sweet spot where a Stable character is more resistant to fear than someone that is Deranged.

A charaacter with insanity less than 10, has a 0 in tens place. This would translate to the first number being 0, not what is in ones column.

And a character with a Insantiy of 56 can have a 0 put in front of that and have a total of 056 so the first digit is 0.

Good luck getting this argument to work on any gm.

If you tried it with me, me response would be something like: We are using a house rule where the tens digit of your insanity is used to check your resistance, not your ones digit.

Yeeeah, attempting that would quickly result in a dreadsocking. All games have Rule 0, the Dark Heresy/Rogue Trader/Ascension line especially so, and this clearly violates the spirit of the rules. Arguing this is pointless - laughing at you for arguing it, however, is well worth the effort.

Banjulhu said:

Actually no, because insanity does no go over 99 for players. If you would gain insanity points to put you over 99, your character becomes a npc.

No offense to any designer, and no disrespect to GW and FF. Every single Rule Book has been laced with typos and inconsistencies. Until they proof read the books better; I wouldn't hide behind RAW and would strive to accomplish the spirit of the rules.

Especially in this case, there is no way to justify why an insanity score of under 10 but above 0 would be immune to fear. The rule was called "only the insane shall prosper" and it says: "the more insane a character becomes the less horrific things seem." Also under 10 insanity is listed as "Stable". Apparently RAW is inconsistant with other things written in the same section.

Guys this is a d100 system. Notice how the characteristics for NPCs have e.g. Fel 05, not 5?

Elohiem_Militant said:

I second that!

Insanity:

Fear 1: 20+ to be immune
Fear 2: 40+
Fear 3: 60+
Fear 4: 80+

Pretty clear to me...

Once you're 80% crazy, not much gets through your senses enough to scare you, lol.

Pretty sure this is a joke topic, but it is a funny catch in the semantics of the rules. I would applaud the players idea, right before I take my Deathwatch CE case, and introduce his face to it.

It seems obvious to me that Banjulhu was simply amused at the writers' oversight & wanted to share, not get over. I'm with you Banj; I love finding "holes in the script" for personal amusement ONLY.

KommissarK said:

I take everything here seriously =( if for no other reason then to work on my own rules knowledge and to get a feel for the general consensus.