The Fear

[eruditus]

Okay so I ran my first game of Burning Wheel last night...

YAY!

I wanted to make certain I was doing something right though -

Setup: So there is a critter stomping into the camp of three sleeping adventurers and their oblivious watchman. the creature gets up to the camp fire before she sees it and so when she does she rolls a Steel test hesitating for three rounds to which she decides to run and scream. Due to the screaming the other members of the group awake and also make Steel tests. The tracker also up-and-runs while the Knight just lies there dumbfounded. The only one not stupefied by the sight of the enormous creature is the Diviner. Combat ensues:

The Diviner casts The Fear while the creature is circling:

I had her Sorcery successes reduce its Steel Successes and despite its G6 Steel it hesitated 2 actions. Running people tried to regroup and the sorcerer danced around the thing using the fear on and off until the knight got her wits about her readied her flail and hit it with a great strike.

Is this about how The Fear should be handled?

[eruditus]

Okay, so mikeryan and i discussed The Fear and he pointed out that there is no ^ over the spell so sorcery successes do not do anything, its justs straight Steel roll.

and with a G6 and a 5 hesitation, it probably will only slow it marginally :)

[Kublai]

Yeah, the Fear only causes a straight Steel test. It's The Horror that adds Obstacles to the target's Hesitation.

Technically, the Horror doesn't reduce the target's successes, but adds to his Obstacle. A slight difference, but it's important when PCs are trying to get tests.