Mechanics of Fear, Good idea or not? Options

[MrSandman666]

Some games, like The Call of the Cthulhu or the not-so-well-known SLA Industries have rules for situations involving fear.
In these games, characters have some sort of 'Cool' stat, which determines how easily they are scared and how they react in fear-inducing situations. When entering such situations there is a roll on this Cool attribute with the TN determined by the scariness of the situation. How well you do on the roll determines your reaction to some degree (panic, fainting, coma, psychosis, shock...)
Additionally, this attribute is handled more dynamicaly.It changes in response to situations. If resisting a fearful situation exeptionaly well, it is raised. For failing miserably, it is lowered. This is to simulate the hardening or breaking of the mental barriers. Someone who is used to fearful situations is harder to scare whereas others start to deteriorate when exposed to fear too often. Of course one can still use Karma to raise it. Going to a therapy or simply working on yourself would be ways to do so.

What do you think... is this a good way of handling fear? I would say yes, since many players play their characters as fearless, emotionless ice-cubes, which is somewhat irrealistic. This rule would only give a framework for roleplaying. THe actual reaction is still up to the player. He or she still has to play the character panicing or fainting or suffering a psychosis.

[Sphynx]

Don't aim for too much realism, you'll end up with characters too scared to even imagine Shadowrunning since there's a ton more reasons NOT to do it, than to do it.

I think it's a horrible idea.

Sphynx

[Siege]

In "Call of Cthulhu", the whole premise is 'normal' people being flung into mind-bending situations above and beyond the ken of the norm.

Unless you are planning on running a lot of Horror-based campaigns, Shadowrun just isn't geared for that "ooh, icky" monster kind of storyline.

Truthfully, you can inflict a great deal of terror on your players by using Perception rolls with the appropriate modifiers. And penalty mods for situations.

-Siege

[Dashifen]

I've simulated that kind of an effect with Willpower as well. For example, if a character new to the shadows we to be involved in their first firefight, I might consider a willpower test ... perhaps with a target number equal to the number of bad-guys involved ... to see if the noob can be effective or if their quivering in fear, huddled behind the desk. :vegm:

-- Dash --

[MrSandman666]

If you really wanted to you could turn Shadowrun into a great Horror RPG. Bugs, Horrors, terrorists, psychos, paranoia, mallicious mages, mutated critters... Just think of the possibilities!

Of course, most of the times you know what you're up to or time is not a factor so I guess roleplaying would do the job. However, most people simply forget about roleplaying any serious consequences. Some might say that their character pees their pants but almost none will say they let out a scream or turn to run or faint or freeze.

Imagine breaking into a corporate facility and as you enter the room of the object to be stolen the room is filled by mutilated corpses. The room is smeared with blood and the stench is overwhelming. Now tell me every runner will shrug that one of without a problem. Sure, some might, but these are absolute exeptions.

Or imagine the same situation but instead of the corpses in the room, every monitor in the room says displays a welcome message with your real name, which might not even be known to your fellow runners.

Yeah, I agree. You don't need it all the time, but in certain situations, especially in horror-oriented campaigns that I run.

It's just that I don't expect most players to be good enough to play these effects out.

[Siege]

As long as you don't use the new rules on a regular basis and remember that "Scary" standards are relative.

What would freak a normal person might be a daily occurence to a homicide cop or anyone who's responded to a plane crash.

What kind of mechanic would you use to simulate a character's response to seeing his "real" name broadcast on monitors? As a character, my response would be something, "Oh hell no...sorry, just looking for the exit...<adjust a monitor on a desk as I sprint for a door>"

-Siege

[Sigfried McWild]

I don't feel the need for fear mechanics (but my adventrues tend to leave out much of the more esoteric parts of SR due to a lack of mage PCs).

If I wanted to introduce mechanices for fear I'd use a skill tied to willpower and tons of situational modifiers.

[katiegreen]

What I would like to see is something that emulates the "Fright Check" from GURPS. I GM of mine took us through some serious horror-based Shadowrunning a while back, and I we basically imported the idea of a Fright Check for characters being able to act immediatly, etc. I do like the idea of using a willpower-based system, rather than creating a new stat of some sort.

[Siege]

With a table of modifiers?

Perhaps taking into account character backgrounds for bonuses or penalties?

-Siege

[MrSandman666]

Of course everybody reacts differently to different situations. This would be expressed in individual modifiers. Of course a soldier or mercenarie would have less trouble with bodies. However, they might get really freaked when they are not able to see their opponent, whereas a science geek might be smart enough to pin down the enemy without seing him. He might even enjoy the challenge.
So, not every character would do the test or have the same TN.
I am fully aware that this system is a little blury. It's pretty much up to the GM to assign the modifiers and all this is pretty arbitrary. Trust plays a big role here...

I don't have anything worked out yet rules wise. There are pretty much two ways to do it: use willpower or use a seperate attribute. In a horror campaign I would opt for a new attribute and for the only casual and occasional I would go with willpower.

[MrSandman666]

I'm always for keeping it simple but for one reason I really like the idea of a seperate attribute and that is that it can change independantly. After being exposed to too much emotional stress and fear, you become an emotional wreck who is afraid of his own shadow. Of course I could apply this mechanic for willpower but I find tha a it too harsh, reducing willpower like that. Also, you shouldn't be able to restore lost willpower points by going to a therapie, or should you?

What is this fear check? I never played GURPS.

[Sigfried McWild]

Just thought about this.
What about phobias (flaw)?
As soon as you have a something that deals with fear and allows characters to use karma to make themselves less susceptible to it players might want it applied to phobias too.
You can't really say phobias are completely unrelated to this (you are giving characters something to keep cool when facing horrific situations exactly what they need to deal with phobias) so you should consdier how to deal with it

[Backgammon]

Well, I think certain things, like *not* taking cover when someone shoots at you, could be tested using Willpower or somehting, because it's hard to truly simulate the innate fear the character is feeling to the Player. But horror scenes can be done diceless. I've scared my players before (and plan to in the future, horror scenes are coming up). Hell, I even gave one nightmares one time.

[Hot Wheels]

Leave it up to the GM to generate fear, if they're good they can do it, to be told "You feel L4 fear" just does nothing for story telling and actually distracts you into thinking "Ok what could be donig this?"

[Glyph]

They already have phobias and Flaws like combat paralysis for people who like roleplaying characters who have to battle their fear. For other players, having their characters freezing or running away or losing an action because of a "fear" check wouldn't add one bit to the roleplaying - it would distract from it, in a very BIG way. I played in a Ravenloft campaign once. The DM was very good at describing horror scenes, but the horror checks just annoyed me and broke the mood.

And how a character reacts to frightening circumstances is a very personal thing for players. Some people might want to play someone fearless, and if their character starts turning into a nervous wreck, they might think "Why bother playing if this guy is just going to be pathetic?" Shadowrun is a game where people play hardened killers, cold-blooded pros, and daredevil thrill-seekers. It can have some horror elements, but that is better done by combining flavor text with things that take some control away from the players (such as foes that seem impervious to their normal attacks, a mysterious blackmailer, etc.).

[Comedian]

"Cool" attribute for Shadowrun would be awesome. Suddenly you'd have every munchkin working their "Cool" attribute up to 12 or 15.

B: 3
Q: 4
S: 3
I: 5
W: 6
C: 8
Cool: 23

Description:
Too Cool For You To Read. He's got fifteen seperate Tres Chic Clothing sets, and shades.

[MrSandman666]

Yeah, I've made the experience that everything that takes away the player's controll over their character distracts from overall fun. And dice rolls in the wrong situation (like for example a very atmospheric narative part).

So, yeah, it might be not that good of an idea. Then again, I never really played a game with mechanics for horror. However, I really like the effect how players can become afraid of being afraid. You know, after some point they'll be really scared to open the next door since they won't know what horrific site will be there behind that door.

And the stuff with the cool attribute is not to be misunderstood. Of course it doesn't determine how cool you are but how easily you can keep a cool head. How hard it is to scare you.

[Raiko]

If you do add fear checks to your game, I think it would be better adding another condition monitor to represent the effects of fear, rather than just saying "you run away" or "you hide in the corner."

Make 10 boxes = frozen with fear, and for less than 10 boxes you can apply the usual penalties (eg moderatly scared = +2TN/-2 init).

This way you the players can see how scared their characters are, and they'll start to worry themselves as the boxes fill up.

I hate telling players that their character runs away, using a condition monitor makes it more likely that they'll choose to run or hide themselves in order to avoid becoming "frozen with fear."

All you need to do then is assign a fear level to each scary entity, say:

zombies = (body)L or (body)M
Cthulhu = (body)D (What would his body be, 100? :evil:)

Then apply this each combat round, and leave it up to the players whether they run.

You can also then tie in phobia flaw severities with condition levels.

[Siege]

To add a spin, apply the wound penalties from the "box" idea to all actions that don't directly involve fleeing.

I rate three boxes on the fright monitor, so I'm "moderately" terrified, suffering a...what is it, +2 to all target mods?

And maybe a scaled willpower test to "overcome my trembling hands and get a clean shot".

-Siege

[Crimson Jack]

I don't think they need to overcomplicate the game. There are enough rules to worry about without having to have a detailed system in which someone gets scared. As humans, we can all relate to the concept of fear. A good GM should point out what type of fear a character would have due to a critter power or spell. A good PC should be able to roleplay that.

Call of Cthulu is a great game, but part of its charm is the whole insanity/fear factor of the game. I don't think it needs to be incorporated in SR3 IMO.

[BitBasher]

Bottom line IMHO is that no emotion should ever be just a dice roll or mechanic.

Fear is somehting far more complicated.

Shadowrunners are generally FAR from normal people and deal with things in a way thet we as players cannot concieve of.

[Siege]

A little extreme, maybe.

-Siege

[Bira]

If you want to import insanity mechanics into Shadowrun, you should probably try looking into a game called Unknown Armies. It's modern occult horror, and has an insanity system tailored for abnormal or even outright weird individuals - some of them quite similar to shadowrunners.

Basically, it has five "Madness Meters". IIRC, they are Helplessness, Isolation, Violence, Fear and The Unnatural. Various situations can force a test relating to one of them. Fail too many times and you turn into a certifiable nutjob - pass too many times and you risk turning into a sociopath, someone too jaded and hardened to care about anything anymore.

Sure, you shoot people for a living. But suddenly stumbling upon a huge pile of horribly mutilated corpses who are trying to rip your face off is going to have some effect on you, one way or the other.

If a game you're in uses such a system, and you don't want to bother with the tests, just remember: you don't have to start with a clean slate. Rack up those Hardened Violence notches and go to town with your jaded sociopathic street sam.

[MrSandman666]

The thing I'm worried about is that the players (or rather their characters) will be scared when the situation is current but later, after the run, they'll forget about it and it won't have any lasting effects. I'm sure if I (or my hardened Assassin character, for that matter) stumbles into a situation where a pile of mutilated bodies tries to rip of his face, he would be having nightmares so bad he wouldn't dare to sleep for the next few weeks!
Most players I know will just say "Wow, that was pretty scary! Now let's get the Karma and go on with the next run... Anybdoy want a Coke?"

[BitBasher]

Thing is it doesn't affect all people like that. At all.