Fear Powers
Has anyone come up with a nifty custom move for fear-based powers? I’ve come up with this (which people are welcome to use), but I’d just like to pick other people’s brains.
When you [redacted], tell [redacted] your deepest fear and roll + Hard. On a 10+, you’re OK. On a 7-9, you’re unnerved; hold 1. On a miss, you are visibly shaken up; hold 3.
The Keeper may spend this hold on a 1-for-1 basis any time you attempt to act against [redacted] to force you to Act Under Pressure. You may eliminate any amount of hold by fleeing in a blind panic from [redacted].
Thoughts? I’m intentionally keeping some parts secret in case my players read this. 😉
Hard? You mean Tough? Wouldn’t it be Cool, rather?
I had one monster with an aura power involving fear, that worked quite well throughout the mystery:
Whenever a Hunter first confronts this fell beast, roll +COOL.
10+: Choose two:
7-9: Choose one.
You…
– don’t take flight.
– you are not sickened.
– you are free from this effect for future encounters.
6-: Well. Choose none.
I do indeed mean Tough. I got my AW games mixed up. Whoops. I intentionally chose Tough to represent mental resilience in this case as I feel Cool gets overused (perhaps just at my table).
I like your fear-based move, but allowing them to be immune to future effects on a 7-9 result (even though they’re sicked and flee this time) seems like a really good result rather than a mixed one.
I found that having to run away repeatedly from the same thing gets old quick; so I though “Madness Meter” rather than “Sanity Points”.
In play, it made for some tough decisions, and they had indeed some people run away sick and fearful only to be prepared the next time, while other chose not to flee and held back the beast for the time being, but had to face the evil aura again at a later stage. And they got sick, and sick, and sicker:
You have been sickened again. Roll +TOUGH.
On a 10+, choose one:
– take 1 harm
– you take a permanent physical mark of the beast’s touch (sickness and aging)
– choose a trait. It is reduced by 1 for the rest of the mystery.
On a 7-9, choose two (you may choose the same thing twice)
On a miss, ho boy. I choose stuff then.
So, it wasn’t all about the fear, it was about making ugly choices.