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The Effects of Fear

Your house rules, and add-ons
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Heroglyph
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The Effects of Fear

Post by Heroglyph »

I've been running a supernatural/ horror themed PBeM, and here are some alternate rules I came up with for Fear. I haven't used them in play, but thought I'd post them here to see what others thought.

FEAR
Characters who encounter scenes or creatures of horror, may experience Fear. These are based on the Intimidation rules (p.24), with some additional stuff thrown into reflect different degrees of Fear and it's effects
Typically Intimidation is made in lieu of attacking. Start by rolling a Stat check based on the type of
intimidation used—an act of physical intimidation, such as the lion’s roar, is made by rolling Brawn (and adding any size modifiers as with any other Brawn check) or possibly Agility (as in the case of a martial artist showing off a flurry of moves to his opponent). An act of verbal intimidation is made by rolling Mind or maybe using an appropriate skill—Streetwise or Deception for instance. The target rolls a Mind check against this intimidation check (or alternatively rolls their own skill)— higher number wins.

If the target succeeds, they are not intimidated. If the target fails, means the target is scared—and has a -2 Dice penalty to all rolls made against the source of fear. This includes social interaction as well as combat. The state of fear lasts for the rest of that scene. Note: The Frightening Presence Advantage gives you +2 to your Multiplier to intimidate. Fearless characters are immune to the effects of Intimidation (and have a +2 Dice bonus to intimidate others).


Degrees of Fear

* Scared (as Intimidation above)
* Frightened (Dazed). If Fail Fear check by 10, then lose panel until a 20 Mind check is made. Alternately player can choose to take x2 DM fear based damage instead, which is soaked by Mind or Mind Shield. This can literally , scare you to death if enough Fear damage is taken) )
* Panicked (Daze/Repel) If fail Fear check by 20, then flee in terror, until make 20 Mind check. Player can choose to take x 3DM fear based damage instead)[/list]

Escalating Fear

Fear breads fear. A character who is Scared becomes more susceptible to fear effects. If another effect would make him Scared again, he becomes Frightened instead. If an effect would make him Frightened, then he becomes Panicked. As a general rule, multiple exposure to the same source of fear do not trigger this escalation of fear. However, the Dice penalty from being scared does effect the roll any new Fear checks that must be made in the scene.



Shocking Situations
The table below is a very rough guideline. GM discretion.
Difficulty/Shocking Situation
10 Surprised to find mangled animal carcass
10 Surprised to find human corpse
10 Surprised to find human body part
20 Finding a stream flowing with blood
20 Finding a mangled human corpse
20 Awakening trapped in a coffin
20 Witnessing a friend’s violent death
20 Seeing a ghoul
20 Meeting someone you know to be dead
30 Undergoing severe torture
30 Seeing a corpse rise from its grave
40 Seeing a gigantic severed head fall from the sky
50 Seeing an evil deity
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WaylanderPK
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Post by WaylanderPK »

Looks cool :)
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BASHMAN
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Post by BASHMAN »

That's awesome! I could really see adding something like this as an element to BASH! Fantasy: Ultimate Edition in a "Fantasy Horror" subgenre for doing Cthulhu-esque stuff.
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Heroglyph
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Post by Heroglyph »

I am actually in the very early stages of trying to put together a horror themed BASH supplement. More in the vein of Hellboy/Blade/Buffy/Supernatural rather than Cthulhu.

I "borrowed" some of these concepts from D20 Horror, Chill and Cthulhu, so it would probably have to be heavily reworded.
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