There are multiple action cards (etc) that grant a PC Fear 1 for a few turns, or grant Fear 1 to a single attack. We've got a PC with "Fear Me!" at my table and it hasn't been terribly potent so far… but that may have just been bad rolls.

If a creature or person has Fear 1, the rules state others have to test when they first encounter that character. If you spend multiple turns interacting with them, the rules seem pretty clear that you only roll once. Assuming that's the case, do these effects seem worth it to you?

I'm tempted to make the victims roll again if they try to engage the Fear ed person, or maybe even every time the Fear some person attacks them personally, but I'm worried it might make it too good. It may not be a problem with Fear 1, but I imagine it would prove troubling if the effect generated Terror 3 instead and I'd like any potential house-rule to work across the board.

If an attack has Fear 1, does that affect:

• only the specific target of the attack?
• everyone in the same engagement?
• all foes regardless of positioning as long as there's a reasonable chance of them seeing it?
• everyone in the scene, including friendlies?

If someone uses the same "the attack has Fear 1" action on multiple turns, should the targets roll the subsequent times? My gut says yes, but I'm having a hard time rectifying that against the Fear rating of a monster (or PC) being something you only roll for once.

If I unleash my Fear 1 during a scene where they're facing off against 2 groups of 4 henchmen each, how many willpower tests should the GM make?

• 8 individual tests?
• 2 tests and (if failed) apply the stress (which would be a wound) to each henchman individually? (Total 4 wounds per group)
• 2 tests but if failed only apply the stress (wound) to a single henchman per test? (Only 1 wound per group)

Also, in the cases of making only 2 tests, should those tests gain the bonus 3 white dice that the group of 4 henchman would on it's single attack or other active check?

There's a lot open to GM interpretation in these situations, and I'm curious how others handle them.

r_b_bergstrom said:

heres how we rule that:

if a PC makes an attack which causes fear, i make a check with the difficulty for all enemies with a line of sight to them. each "type" of enemy makes one check.
in a larger battle, if enemies are in a different engagement and are therefor focused on an attack or another PC, they won't see it. but maybe they would hear a PC viciously screaming and cutting flesh, in that case the check might be appropriate again.

and yes, if it is the first time he does something that causes fear, even if he used "perform a stunt" and it is something outrageous, they have to make that check. say he caused fear 2 all PCs would do a fear 2 check the first time he makes the action, if they succeed, next time it will be fear 1 and after passing the fear 1 check they will get used to it and no longer have to roll. if they don't succeed, they have to roll again with the same difficulty they failed at next time the PC tries to do that action.
same goes for friendly NPCs.

note that "normal" monsters do not gain stress/fatigue, instead they gain 1 wound for every stress/fatigue they would gain, which means that even fear can kill them. sounds stupid actually. so in our case, if they would get "killed" by not succeeding at the WP check, they fall unconcious and are left to the PCs mercy after they wake up, or, in my group's case, they won't ever wake up

second part: for henchman i don't roll. they usually just fail these checks and gain wounds/stress/fatigue or whatever equal to the fear rating.

the idea of letting the NPCs or enemies roll everytime they get attakced could be balanced out by also letting the PCs in hearing distance or with a line of sight make the same check. if NPCs can't get used to it, neither can PCs. that makes the fear more risky and they have to ponder wheter or not it it really worth it.

hope my ramblings made sense…
cheers
neph

I really like the idea of not rolling for henchmen and just assume a failure, as it's very elegant and easy at the table. I've run some numbers, and if you just assume each group of henchmen will take wounds equal to the Fear rating of the PC, it seems like it will work okay. Eliminating the die roll and just inflicting a wound makes Fear more consistent and guarantees minor success, but rules-out the possibility of Fear ever being a devastating major effect.

If you're rolling for the NPCs, Fear 1 will usually be no big deal, but every once in a blue moon it will completely wreck someone. This is because two banes are much worse than failure on most Fear checks. On a Fear 1 check, Failure means just 1 stress (or wound), which is usually not a big deal. Double-banes means 1 stress (or wound) per turn , plus a reduction of all the victim's future dice pools. A pretty typical henchman Discipline pool would be 1 red, 2 blue, and 1 white vs 1 purple (assuming Fear 1). 30% chance to fail, and only a 7% chance for double-banes. About 1 roll in 200 will both fail and also generates the 2 banes. That's pretty unreliable, but when it happens it would be pretty memorable.

r_b_bergstrom said:

The results for each of those three approaches would be:

• Method A: 8 individual tests. Average effect: 3 wounds split randomly between the two groups. Chance of zero wounds overall: ~2.5% Chance of 8 or more wounds overall: <1%. 8 rolls for 3 wounds is a lot of time and energy invested for not much payoff.
• Method B: 2 tests, results applied to every henchman in the group Average effect: 3 wounds, all suffered by a single group. Chance of zero wounds overall: ~40% Chance of 8 or more wounds overall: ~14%. I could live with Method B. It's fast, and does roughly the same average "damage" as rolling individually. It is, however, very swingy. Method B Fear does not nibble away at Henchmen, it either ignores them entirely or takes huge ravenous bites out of them. That makes balancing encounters a little harder, so the GM should be prepared for it.
• Method C: 2 tests, results applied to a single henchman per group. Average effect: 1 wound to a single group. Chance of zero wounds overall: ~40% Chance of 8 or more wounds overall: 0%. This method really reduces the overall power of PC actions that generate Fear checks for NPCs. If you use this method, those actions and talents might not be worth the XP they cost.

To that we could add two different versions of the not rolling, for comparison:

• Method D: No Roll, each group takes wounds equal to Fear rating. Average effect: 2 wounds, 1 per group. Chance of zero wounds overall: 0% Chance of 8 or more wounds overall: 0%. A small reduction in average effect from rolling 8 times, but it's fast and elegant. Fear 1 would be reliable and consistent, but not very potent.
• Method E: No Roll, each individual henchman takes wounds equal to Fear rating. Average effect: 8 wounds total, 4 per group, 1 per individual henchman. Chance of zero wounds overall: 0% Chance of 8 or more wounds overall: 100%. This would absolutely devestate henchmen. Could work for a very cinematic campaign, but I think it might get out of hand if the PCs figure out how to boost their rating to Fear 3 or Terror 2.

Method D is tempting for its elegence, but I'm probably going to use Method B instead.

Method B, with the clarification that If a group gets the frightened condition, each henchman will 1 wound per turn. This effectively puts the whole group on a 3- or 4- turn (depending on Toughness) self-destruct countdown. If a group is eliminated in this way, it will usually be narrated as a spectacular morale failure not literal death from fear. They surrender, flee, dissert, trample or betray each other as appropriate.

Odds calculations on the two rolls used by Methods B and C when facing 2 groups of henchmen with willpower 3, fortune 1, stance 1 : ~40% chance of both groups being unaffected. ~38% chance of 1 group failing and the other being unaffected. 9% chance of both groups failing. ~9% of 1 group getting the frightened condition and the other being unaffected ~4% chance of one group failing and the other gaining frightened <1% chance of both groups getting frightened.

Good thoughts there. Having henchmen flee for Fear effects would often be very satisfying narratively, sometimes it would weaken the "meaningful opposition" too much.

I also find "wounds for stress/fatigue" a bit strange. I go with "burn off the Agg/Cunning etc. dice" and after that it becomes more "they likely retreat".

Other possibilities are to make the henchmen less effective are to put a Fear marker on them and add a challenge die to their attacks or make them choose defensive actions such as Guarded Position (with bonus fortune dice for being a bunch, that's actually a very good choice for them to use defending a more significant boss monster etc.).

If you're rolling for the NPCs, Fear 1 will usually be no big deal, but every once in a blue moon it will completely wreck someone. This is because two banes are much worse than failure on most Fear checks. On a Fear 1 check, Failure means just 1 stress (or wound), which is usually not a big deal. Double-banes means 1 stress (or wound) per turn , plus a reduction of all the victim's future dice pools. A pretty typical henchman Discipline pool would be 1 red, 2 blue, and 1 white vs 1 purple (assuming Fear 1). 30% chance to fail, and only a 7% chance for double-banes. About 1 roll in 200 will both fail and also generates the 2 banes. That's pretty unreliable, but when it happens it would be pretty memorable.

Just a specification: the Frightened condition (that a character receives if he or she generates 2 banes in a Fear or in a Terror test) only diminishes chances of succeeding (converting one less die to a stance die) and generates stress if the character with the condition stays engages with the source of the condition. So what 2 banes would translate is the frightened character trying to disengage from the source if possible.

On the other hand, very easily Fear Me! generates Fear 2 instead of 1, which enhances a lot the power of the effect. Also it can generate one misfortune die on it's target, always something worthwhile.

I think I would only permit it to have effect on a group of adversaries (rather than on a single target) as a Sigmar's Comet effect. But one thing comes to my mind: discussing the Blunderbuss, someone (wasn't it you, r_b?) came up with the definition that an engagement could be a target. But I'm thinking only if the specification is target engagement , right? If I'm not mistaken, a lot of cards would really change if "target" could be an individual or an engagement.

If you're rolling for the NPCs, Fear 1 will usually be no big deal, but every once in a blue moon it will completely wreck someone. This is because two banes are much worse than failure on most Fear checks. On a Fear 1 check, Failure means just 1 stress (or wound), which is usually not a big deal. Double-banes means 1 stress (or wound) per turn , plus a reduction of all the victim's future dice pools. A pretty typical henchman Discipline pool would be 1 red, 2 blue, and 1 white vs 1 purple (assuming Fear 1). 30% chance to fail, and only a 7% chance for double-banes. About 1 roll in 200 will both fail and also generates the 2 banes. That's pretty unreliable, but when it happens it would be pretty memorable.

Just a specification: the Frightened condition (that a character receives if he or she generates 2 banes in a Fear or in a Terror test) only diminishes chances of succeeding (converting one less die to a stance die) and generates stress if the character with the condition stays engages with the source of the condition. So what 2 banes would translate is the frightened character trying to disengage from the source if possible.

You're right in that most Frightened characters are going to disengage on their next action. My 1 stress per turn was assuming the Fear source pursues you, which they usually would.

I now see there's actual several ways to interpret the text on pages 90 & 93 of the Player's Guide and also the Frightened card. Ambiguity and ripple effects abound.

The phrase "first confronts the creature" on page 90 kinda sounds like it means "when first engaged". If so, this creates a paradox. How could you ever resolve Thundering Shot? That action can only be used if disengaged, but it gives the attack Fear 1. That makes no sense, so "first confronts the creature or situation" must mean "when you first see the creature or situation" instead of requiring engagement.

If that's the correct intepretation (and I believe it is), then it seems to me that the "Dependent" effect of Frightened is not based on being engaged. It's still a little vague, but if most Fear checks are going to happen when you first see the Fear source (and thus aren't engaged), having Frightened only last while engaged would make Frightened really weak. You'd almost always get over it before even taking a Stress.

Instead it seems to me like the phrase "as long as the circumstance mandating the effect exists" on page 93 is more likely to mean (at least in the case of Frightened) "until the end of the encounter". I'm a little uncomfortable about how that reads so much into the rules, but it seems more functional and logical. It doesn't render Frightened completely pointless the way the other interpretation would, and it works for cases of Thundering Shot or fights where you first see the Greater Daemon at Medium Range. Seems to me that disengaging only protects you from the effects of Frightened while you're disengaged, it doesn't necessarily make Frightened go away... but that's just my interpretation.

Then there's the issue of whether or not the engagement clause on the first sentence / effect of the Frightened condition also applies to the second sentence / effect on that card. I'd been reading them as two independent effects, but I see now that's not the only way to parse it.

Hmm...

I think I would only permit it to have effect on a group of adversaries (rather than on a single target) as a Sigmar's Comet effect. But one thing comes to my mind: discussing the Blunderbuss, someone (wasn't it you, r_b?) came up with the definition that an engagement could be a target. But I'm thinking only if the specification is target engagement , right? If I'm not mistaken, a lot of cards would really change if "target" could be an individual or an engagement.

The Blunderbuss example is irrelevant here. Blunderbuss affects a whole engagement only because the Blast quality (page 98) says it does. You can only target an entire engagement if a card or power says you can, and that's pretty rare if you aren't using a Blunderbuss.

In the case of Fear Me, the action targets a single victim. Only that victim is Influenced, and only that victim can get the Stress or black die from Fear Me's boon lines.

However, Fear Me also gives the active character a Fear Rating (Fear 1 or Fear 2) for several turns. Per the rules discussed above, Fear ratings affect everyone nearby, as soon as they "first confront the creature or situation", whatever that means. So only 1 target is Influenced, but everyone nearby has to take a Fear test.

You're right in that most Frightened characters are going to disengage on their next action. My 1 stress per turn was assuming the Fear source pursues you, which they usually would.

I now see there's actual several ways to interpret the text on pages 90 & 93 of the Player's Guide and also the Frightened card. Ambiguity and ripple effects abound.

The phrase "first confronts the creature" on page 90 kinda sounds like it means "when first engaged". If so, this creates a paradox. How could you ever resolve Thundering Shot? That action can only be used if disengaged, but it gives the attack Fear 1. That makes no sense, so "first confronts the creature or situation" must mean "when you first see the creature or situation" instead of requiring engagement.

If that's the correct intepretation (and I believe it is), then it seems to me that the "Dependent" effect of Frightened is not based on being engaged. It's still a little vague, but if most Fear checks are going to happen when you first see the Fear source (and thus aren't engaged), having Frightened only last while engaged would make Frightened really weak. You'd almost always get over it before even taking a Stress.

Ok, I have to remind myself that the matter here is making Fear a weak effect or not.

It seems reasonable to me that you get frightened by the person or action that makes you roll the fear check whenever they make you roll it. It would usually be when you are in the presence of the Fear effect, i.e., when you see or feel it someway. So you don't need to be engaged with it, and the Dependent effect of Frightened would be "in the presence of someone or something that gives Fear or Terror".

It also seems reasonable that if you are frightened by something or someone, you would feel a lot more stressed if you were in close contact with it, to the effect of gaining one stress per turn you are engaged with the creature or thing. If you aren't as close, the stressfulness would be less, so maybe you wouldn't get a Stress per turn; but you are Frightened. That's a narrative cue. Act it, or make the NPC act it. That is quite effective.

As it makes narrative sense to me, thinking about the mechanics...

A character gains Frightened by the action of the person that made a Melee attack against him. He is engaged. So he gains 1 Stress for the Fear 1 effect (or 2 if it's Fear 2, which would make it more effective in terms of a nuisance). If the Fear effect was the action, it ends there. If the character has Fear gained fear through an action, it continues. When his turn starts and he is engaged with the source of Fear, he also gains 1 stress. If we are thinking of a situation of a character that would want to attack no matter what (which is not every character), than he makes a melee attack and disengages, or he disengages and makes a ranged attack. considering he has a ranged weapon in hand and ready, that is all.

Next round, the character with Fear moves to engage the Frightened one and make another attack. If the Frightened character still lives, he is again engaged, and gains another Stress his next turn. He also has to decide if attacks and disengage or the other way. The second time you are engaged with the source of your fear, I would question the GM or the player running the character if he wouldn't be more affected by it, ie, how could he base his decision including this factor. Anyway, if he decides to disengage and make a ranged attack, if he is using a crossbow or thrown weapon he will need another manoeuvre to ready the weapon. That's a fatigue.

In total, the Frightened character has got at least 3 stress tokens in, what, two turns? And he got attacked as well. That is no minor effect to me. And I would, if not demand, suggest strongly that that would be taken into account in the decision making of the character. That is effectivness as well.

Instead it seems to me like the phrase "as long as the circumstance mandating the effect exists" on page 93 is more likely to mean (at least in the case of Frightened) "until the end of the encounter". I'm a little uncomfortable about how that reads so much into the rules, but it seems more functional and logical. It doesn't render Frightened completely pointless the way the other interpretation would, and it works for cases of Thundering Shot or fights where you first see the Greater Daemon at Medium Range. Seems to me that disengaging only protects you from the effects of Frightened while you're disengaged, it doesn't necessarily make Frightened go away... but that's just my interpretation.

I agree with you that disengage doesn't make Frightened go away, nor that it should. But I think this actions and the Frightened condition are alright the way they are, with Frightened just giving 1 stress per turn if engaged. About Thundering Shot, that is an attack and causes damage. It also causes Fear. If the characters seeing it fail the Fear test, they also get the Stress, and it's an extra effect. It's just something else, and I think it's sufficiently powerful that way. I understand that the Frightened condition wouldn't mean much here, just perhaps some narrative effect. It would also be difficult to rule, because if the source of the Fear was an action, it wouldn't exactly be the character... I would rule it based on the situation, and the worse thing that could happen mechanically speaking would be that the two banes on the roll wouldn't create the Frightened condition, but another thing that could even be more useful to the PC.

I think I would only permit it to have effect on a group of adversaries (rather than on a single target) as a Sigmar's Comet effect. But one thing comes to my mind: discussing the Blunderbuss, someone (wasn't it you, r_b?) came up with the definition that an engagement could be a target. But I'm thinking only if the specification is target engagement , right? If I'm not mistaken, a lot of cards would really change if "target" could be an individual or an engagement.

The Blunderbuss example is irrelevant here. Blunderbuss affects a whole engagement only because the Blast quality (page 98) says it does. You can only target an entire engagement if a card or power says you can, and that's pretty rare if you aren't using a Blunderbuss.

Alright, thought so.

In the case of Fear Me, the action targets a single victim. Only that victim is Influenced, and only that victim can get the Stress or black die from Fear Me's boon lines.

However, Fear Me also gives the active character a Fear Rating (Fear 1 or Fear 2) for several turns. Per the rules discussed above, Fear ratings affect everyone nearby, as soon as they "first confront the creature or situation", whatever that means. So only 1 target is Influenced, but everyone nearby has to take a Fear test.

Understood. And that makes Fear Me! sufficiently powerful in my opinion.

The player at my table with "Fear Me!" seems to have stopped using it. Last session, the party ambushed three groups of skaven henchmen, and even though he was going before them, he chose not to use it. He figured any of his Melee Attacks were likely to deal 6 to 9 wounds after soak, whereas the Fear Me would at best do about half that in stress-damage split between the three stacks. Running the numbers after the fact, I agree with his gut instinct on that. A typical clanrat henchman has a 66% chance to pass Fear 1, and a 95% chance to not be Frightened, and that's before any bonuses from A/C/E.

I think the issue here is the henchmen rules. Physical attacks are effectively buffed up vs henchmen, but psychological effects aren't. Henchmen have about 1/3 the wounds on non-henchman, take bonus damage from crits, and share wounds. A single Basic Attack can kill 2 to 4 with a good roll. Fear and Terror, on the other hand, are no better against Henchmen than they are against named characters. The henchman rules make it easier to kill a henchman, but do nothing to make it easier to get him to retreat or surrender.

A couple possible solutions spring to mind:

• I could just stop using henchmen, but then I'd have to settle for much smaller fight scenes (or a lot of dead PCs).
• I could make henchmen just auto-fail the fear test, but that could be a problem if a PC ever gains Fear 3. It's probably too good overall, at least if I keep interpreting the Fatigue as Wounds. If it were simply knocking down A/C/E that might be better balanced. I haven't been doing that, because letting A/C/E absorb fatigue like that also buffs up the monsters. Hmm.
• I could add an extra purple die to all henchman Fear and Terror tests. That would drop the clanrat fear test success (and no-bane) rates from 66% (and 95%) to 44% (and 88%). Total stress-damage would be 8 points split between the three henchman groups, so it's about on par with just using a Melee Attack.
• I could rely more heavily on Morale trackers, and make them shorter. Every time I've used them, they've been kind of extraneous, as by the time the monster's morale broke there wasn't more than 1 monster left. Maybe I'm making the trackers too long, or not moving the counter often enough. I'm not sure what exchange rates I'd have to set up to make Fear 1 move the Morale tracker further than simply killing 3 of their comrades would. I dunno.

Anyone got any other ideas I'm overlooking?

Maybe Fear can increase if the character also starts killing a lot of enemies.

In some cases, when morale is not low or when the NPCs would act this way, you could describe the enemy acting with rage after one of his friends is killed. If the killer had Fear, they would be more fearful. Also, you could state that if the character becomes someone who inspires Fear, his enemies would be less likely to attack him, and maybe run from a fight. If the character's goal turn to make them run (perhaps because he or his friends are having a hard time fighting), then he could choose to use Fear Me! not as an action that would compete with his attacks, but have another result altogether.

And maybe Fear could work as extra defence, adding misfortune to attacks (maybe just half for ranged?) and the effects that adds more misfortune would be added on top of that. I didn't check that out, just a quick thought.